Today's homes and offices often include a wide variety of electronic media devices, such as televisions (TVs), set-top boxes (STBs), and media players/recorders, such as digital video recorders (DVRs), and devices equipped with browsers and players for accessing electronic media available on the Internet. Such electronic media devices often can be operated by remote controls that transmit optical or radio frequency (RF) signals to complementary receivers in the electronic devices.
Remote controls include devices having a variety of push buttons that can interact with a variety of menus presented to a user on a TV or other display in a graphical user interface (GUI). Remote controls having touch-sensitive screens are becoming more widely available today. In particular, touch-sensitive screens are more and more common on mobile phones, tablet and netbook computers, and other portable electronic devices, and the electronic processors in such devices can be programmed to operate home electronic media devices.
Electronic media devices are known that enable users to set up program reminders so that a device, such as a TV, automatically starts and tunes to a desired program, and users today can often program such operations via GUIs and their remote controls. If a user wants to watch a set of programs that will be presented on a set of different channels, the user must either use a program guide and switch between channels when a desired program starts or program in advance a set of reminders with a set of commands on the remote control. After set up is complete, which is to say, after the user has manually created a “playlist” of programs, viewing can begin.
Familiar problems arise when the start times and durations of programs conflict with each other and/or when a user must attend to another activity during a program. In the latter case, a user must set up recording of one or more programs with yet another set of commands on the remote control and media device. If the user wants to pause viewing a program after the program playlist has been set up, parts of the set up procedure can need to be manually repeated. In short, it is currently difficult for users to create playlists of programs that the users want to view in “real time”, i.e., when they are presented.
Personal DVRs today also typically are technically restricted with respect to the number of simultaneous recordings they can make by limited bandwidth to the home and STB input/output (I/O) limitations. Recording more than one or two programs simultaneously with a personal DVR is usually not possible. DVR functionality can be provided outside the home, in the communication network, that does not suffer from the limitations of personal DVRs, but network DVRs are typically subject to other limitations, e.g., limitations arising from digital rights management considerations. As a result, either a network DVR is not available at all, or it may be available for only some programs and/or/channels.
Some approaches to creating media program playlists are known. For example, Backbone Networks Corp. announced in 2004 a Backbone Video product that enabled Internet TV streaming, with creation and automation of programs and schedules by dragging and dropping video/audio files onto a program playlist. Information on the Backbone Video product is available at www.backbone.com. For another example, U.S. Patent Application Publication No. US 2010/0180298 by Kim et al. states that it relates to a terminal device coupled to a broadcasting receiving apparatus. The terminal device includes a communication unit which receives electronic program guide (EPG) information from the Internet, a display unit that displays EPG information, and a control unit that controls the broadcasting receiving apparatus to perform an operation corresponding to a selection.
Nevertheless, prior approaches to creation and use of “live” program playlists do not resolve the problems described above.